by Ben F

So having been part of the audio crew for U2360, in Tampa, I decided to go see them in Miami as a fan. Plus this time, I got to see the entire show. In Tampa, the production crew had to meet up during "Crazy" to get ready for load out. I brought my brother along, who has only seen one other concert, in his entire life. He was blown away by it!

Yeah, the 1st 6 songs were just total rock!...Real Thing, Fly, Mysterious Ways, UTEOTW, IWF and Boots! However, North Star, Zooropa, Miss Sarajevo and Scarlet were not for the "fair weather" fans. It's great that Larry went back to the original drum patterns for With or Without You....almost like the Rattle & Hum version. Great to hear HMTMKMKM. Glad that it didn't rain, although the cool breeze affected the sound...that swirly sound, going in and out. This happens to all P.A.'s! The breeze will always affect the highs and mids of the sound. Also, it seemed like Joe O'Herlihy was having a tough time with feedback (around the 8khz to 10khz range, for you audio peeps). It would occur from time to time when Bono was directly underneath one of the P.A.'s...when he's on the b-stage. Then Joe would bring down Bono's voice, to get rid of it. However, it didn't seem to affect the band. The Edge's guitar was over-powering at times. Overall, it was great to see them again....as a fan! It almost seemed like they were going to play Out of Control, as the closer, as Dallas handed The Edge his guitar, standing by his FX pedal board, away from his Yamaha electric piano. Bono talked for a bit, but then he told Willie to turn down the lights, and have everyone hold up their cell phones....MOS. It's reassuring when Bono says, "we are not retiring!" Although Beautiful Day is my least favorite U2 hit, their live version was perfect. Also, the reworked version of Even Better Than The Real Thing needs to be released!

Apart from the annoying couple behind us, wife arguing (loudly) with her husband, coz he didn't respond to her text, while he got beer, the crowd was great....glad they moved! It was an international crowd. Beautiful women, from all over the world, were present!

As for the opener, it would have made a lot of sense if Lenny Kravitz opened up for U2. He does reside there for some parts of the year. Instead, Florence and the Machines opened....not really into them.

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